The medical students and local doctors of Hoveraid supply basic health care in remote areas of Madagascar. Consultations take place in village schools, when possible. They identify more serious patients for referral to a local hospital where a team of specialists from the capital Antananarivo will work for a week, mainly doing operations.
One of the Malagasy doctors examining a patient.
Smartphones and the tropical medicine handbook can (sometimes) help.
Collecting blood for a malaria test. It is a major cause of death.
Through marshes back to the hovercraft.
The hovercraft is a pleasant change from every-day life.
Operations are done under primitive conditions.
Keeping an eye on the drip.
Plastic cloth against the ceiling must prevent bat droppings hitting the operating table.
The specialists from the capital also work as volunteers.
The operating room.
Students discussing the goings-on in the operating theatre.
The pharmacy, a table with some medicines.
A young patient has collapsed.
A patient, still on a drip, is carried into a room after his operation.
Room with patients and their families, who take care of them.
Seriously ill patient.
Dentistry consists only of extractions and stitching, but brings much relief.
In the absence of lamps smart phones are used to throw light.
When someone can not be helped occasionally a small plane may come to take the patient to the capital.
Madagaskar, 23-11-2015, medische studenten vrijwilligers uit Nederland en lokale artsen en medewerkers drinken en proosten in een dorpskroeg
Madagascar, medical student volunteers from the Netherlands and local doctors and colleagues drink and salute in a local bar. r
Foto: Roel Burgler
